


Is It The Blood?

by Sevent



Series: Emhyralt - The Witcher Bingo [2]
Category: Wiedźmin | The Witcher (Video Game), Wiedźmin | The Witcher - All Media Types
Genre: Anal Fingering, Anal Sex, Blood Kink, Bloodplay, Danger Kink, Dom/sub Undertones, Emhyr Doesn't Admit Anything, Facial Shaving, Finger Sucking, Knifeplay, M/M, Smut, So Many Under-negotiated Kinks, Under-negotiated Kink, Uninformed Consent
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-24
Updated: 2020-12-24
Packaged: 2021-03-10 23:02:27
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,436
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28275027
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sevent/pseuds/Sevent
Summary: Monsterhunting is slimy, bloody work. Geralt gets covered in gore far too often for his—or anyone's—liking. Anyone, it seems, except for Emhyr.
Relationships: Emhyr var Emreis/Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia
Series: Emhyralt - The Witcher Bingo [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2057307
Comments: 25
Kudos: 127





	Is It The Blood?

**Author's Note:**

> Bingo prompt: _Blood Play_
> 
> **Disclaimer:** No game spoilers here, but as most of you only know my writing from the Netflix show: Emhyr's existence is one big-ass book/story spoiler, so if you don't know or you haven't played the games, don't look him up.

Sometimes, Geralt wishes he’d been given a different calling in life. 

He wonders what I’d be like if he'd apprenticed as an herbalist, or a shoemaker, instead of spending two lifetimes slicing down monsters as a witcher—if only because there’s always one day of his week where he ends up covered head to toe in either sewage, mud, or a combination of monster body fluids.

Today it seems to be blood, as a chort’s neck becomes quite the gushing fountain when decapitated. 

He would like to have just one contract that doesn’t end with him elbow deep in gore. Contractors have gotten a little too comfortable demanding evidence of a job well done. And what better evidence than a recognizable chunk of the monster put up for contract?

It’s not too bad most of the time. Worse is when he’s interrupted from collecting payment and he has to stew in a monster’s bloody remains for more hours than necessary. But that’s what baths are for. 

Baths, the gods-sent luxuries, may be expensive, but he will never skip one if he can help it. The coin for a finished contract _will_ immediately go into getting one. This close to Vizima he’ll book a bathhouse with his hard-earned coin and say fuck all to everything and everyone else, until he’s fresh and clean and smelling of plucked roses. And he doesn't even _like_ the smell of roses.

There’s just one person in the whole Continent he can’t push off his case, and he knows it’s coming when he sees a squadron of imperial guards beeline through the city crowd straight to him.

It doesn’t matter that he already put down coin for the bathhouse. They bring him to the emperor while he’s still covered in chort’s blood.

He tried asking for an hour’s time to wash off, but, as the guards escorting him across Vizima’s palace grounds say, “You are to come as quickly as possible, no excuses. It is his imperial majesty’s command,” and there is no denying their archmagnificence’s commands.

Mererid, the emperor’s personal chamberlain, walks him dutifully through the palace and to his imperial majesty’s private audience with muted horror. Horror because he’s dirtying the polished floor, Geralt expects. The overburdened man _would_ care more about him leaving a messy trail than actually being a walking horrorshow. Whatever the emperor asks for, though, the chamberlain provides, no matter how much Mererid wants to call an army of maids to scrub the life out of him.

Geralt can sympathize. He’d like to have the life scrubbed out of himself too. 

Showing up covered in the guts of his last contract kill might teach Emhyr that waiting is a virtue he could spare some time to practice. He’s getting what he asked for—and that’s a _bloody_ unwashed witcher.

The doors that lead to the emperor part and allow him entry. A customary introduction of titles waves him in. 

At his name, the witcher walks forward with a smug grin and an even _more_ smug bow. Mererid leaves them with a barely withheld scream.

He’s lucky it’s a private audience, else he’d be giving the pretentious aristocrats of Emhyr’s court fuel to call him and his entire witcher caste disgusting barbarians. Fortunately, it’s just himself and the emperor, who stops reading whatever report is sitting in front of his eyes to look up at him. 

His reaction is unexpected. Where Geralt expected disgust, shock, maybe even a dash of contempt, what actually happens is, plainly— _surprisingly—_ nothing.

Emhyr var Emreis simply looks him over once and goes on to what he’d called him in for—to verbally berate the witcher for undermining the word of his field general in upholding Nilfgaardian law. Pretty much what the witcher guessed was the point half a mile into his trip. 

It’s just that, well. Geralt isn’t that crazy, but he swears he smells something like arousal in the room, and with just the two of them in it, he’s pressed to think it’s coming from _Emhyr._

Might be he’d been doing something of an intimate nature before speaking to the witcher. The smell of sweat and sex lingers on humans for a good while after. He’s not sure what to think of it, as Emhyr speaks on, as adamant and stone-faced as ever.

Whatever it is he catches, he doesn’t think much of it related to himself. He’s a right bloody mess. A surgeon’s rag wetted on a battlefield gurney. It can’t possibly be because of _him._

So when he’s dismissed with a firm order not to meddle in public affairs, Geralt mostly forgets about it.

The thing is, it happens again.

The second time around, he’s not rushed to meet Emhyr, once more called to the emperor right after a contract. It was an archgriffin this time—a great winged beast flying rogue over the Temerian capital’s farmlands, now terrorizing the villagers and their livestock no longer. 

The summons comes before he can collect his reward, but again, there’s no sense of urgency. Geralt is given ample time to wash up and gather his things. 

It’s just that he chooses not to.

His train of thought is, since the emperor didn’t seem to mind it the first time, why not show up and cause an actual scene? Why not surprise some snooty nobles into losing their composure as he passes by with a too-sharp smile and a face drenched in dark blood?

Mererid might actually hate him this time. Because sure, he could have followed the chamberlain to a steamy hot bath and had his horrendously stained clothes washed for him. He _could_ have, and it would have been great. 

It’s just that he _loves_ being an absolutely insufferable nuisance more. 

It soothes an itch in Geralt’s brain when a prick who gossips tirelessly behind his back sees him—with his pulsing black veins and his white hair smeared with blood so dark the ends look dipped in ink—and the asshole takes off running in the opposite direction. 

His ruined clothes are worth it. Even the disapproving nods of the people who have grown to know him—like poor old Mererid—are worth it.

And then there’s Emhyr and his enduring, unimpressed stare. 

Really, goading _him_ is the most itchy his brain gets. Emhyr is so unflappable, but every man has a tick. A weak point. One of these days that itch will finally be scratched and he’ll catch Emhyr losing his carefully-maintained coolness. 

Today does not seem to be that day. 

Again Emhyr takes in the witcher’s sorry state, worse than before by the lasting toxic effect of his potions, and again he says nothing of it. To the witcher’s disappointment, he doesn’t even stand up. Most people would be a little bit concerned, if not unsettled.

But of course, Emhyr is not most people.

A heavily-scribed parchment being dropped over the desk is the most acknowledgement Geralt gets.

“I have read,” Emhyr starts, “far too many reports of you going around barracks to play cards with every man that breathes.” 

“Yeah. There a problem?”

“It is interrupting their training drills.”

Geralt briefly wonders who’s ballsy enough to report his harmless actions to the emperor in hopes of getting him in trouble. But as he is not being immediately reprimanded, his games are most probably inconsequential in Emhyr’s mind. Just not something he can ignore if it’s a _lot_ of complaints. 

“Would you listen to how I see it?” Geralt asks, blinking through a strand of wet hair that’s chosen that moment to slip over one of his eyes. 

He tucks it back behind his ear without thinking, forgetting for a second that his hunting gloves are still soaked with blood. On his cheek, a heavy droplet slowly makes its way down to his scruffy beard.

Emhyr waves for him to go on. 

Geralt takes just a second longer to explain himself, as he cannot help but notice Emhyr’s unflinching focus over his face. It’s almost too focused. 

He feels that itch in his brain flare up.

“I know Nilfgaardian regiment needs their soldiers to be as obedient as broken horses,” and maybe he puts a little too much punch into his phrasing, going by Emhyr’s narrowing eyes, “But a little room for personality and an hour of fun would do their patriotic motivation wonders.”

“And am I to believe you are playing with them for this supposed good?”

“No. That’s just what you can tell your commanders.” Putting on his biggest grin, Geralt adds with a furtive whisper, “Between you and me, I was bored and looking for a challenge.”

As he says it, he moves closer to the desk to lean over it, in the process splaying a fat, bloody handprint on the desk's varnish. 

Emhyr glances down at it for a split second before his severe gold brown eyes meet his yellow ones, a bit too fast to be casual.

A snappy thought pops up into his mind that he _knows_ will annoy Emhyr. But before he can say it, that unmistakable scent makes itself known to him, much clearer now with his senses still heightened from the hunt and the potions running through his bloodstream. 

Everything comes to a halt. 

He could have let it go the first time. But twice in his presence? _Because_ of his presence?

Whatever it is he’s doing to excite Emhyr, he would like to keep it going until the man owns up to it or, inversely, explodes with furious embarrassment. He can just about hear the wheels grinding in Emhyr’s head, so the latter may yet come true. 

The stare burning a hole in his cheek, for one, is giving him an idea. 

He’s playing with a dangerous flame here, but no one ever taught Geralt _not_ to court danger. No, they gave him a sword and told him to run at it. 

What’s beautiful is Emhyr goes on with their conversation unperturbed. He catches on to Geralt’s purposeful provocations, it’s written in his knowing eyes. And yet, he gives nothing away.

“So you’ve assigned yourself the duty of teaching them about insubordination, witcher?”

There’s a threat building in Emhyr’s tone, which is really only spurring Geralt on to say with heavy sarcasm, “You’re purposely twisting my words, your majesty.”

The desk suffers more grime as Geralt lays both his hands over its surface, with the excuse to bring him a half distance closer than he was before to Emhyr, who remains the seated lord of the castle. 

Anyone else would cringe back in either disgust or fear. Not just because of the blood, but for the darkened veins around the witcher’s face, brought upon by ingesting one too many potions. And Emhyr nearly seems to, except his leaning back is done in order to raise his chin higher. 

His unrelenting gaze can only go so high when he’s sitting, though, and Geralt is not like other people. He’s never been intimidated by him. He owes Emhyr nothing of subservience.

So it’s very easy for the witcher to tilt his head down and make a show of sniffing him.

Emhyr’s stare becomes murderous. 

“Step back now, witcher.”

He does not. He does the exact opposite, approaching from one side of the desk, one of his hands a pivot over the stained wood. “I have questions.”

Emhyr’s voice takes on a warning timbre. “Geralt.”

“Just one question then. Did you plan for this?”

Geralt catches the answer through gritted teeth. “No.”

“Hm. Neither did I. I hate being this filthy.” 

As if to demonstrate, the witcher slicks his hand over his hair and it comes away dripping red. Some of the blood has dried on his skin, but most of it still seeps all the way down to the inside of his boots. Archgriffin blood is, for some damning reason, viscous and slippery like oil, which just makes it impossible to clean up. 

“Could have cleaned up before I came,” Geralt adds after some consideration. “I wanted to. Now I’m glad I didn’t.”

That freshly-bloodied hand moves on the back of Emhyr’s chair, starting a thin trail of blood on its spine. 

He could be hung for this, probably. Playing with the emperor is much more deserving of a hanging than playing cards with soldiers, he would think. But as Emhyr is instead putting in monumental effort not to rise to his teasing, Geralt very much doubts it will end with that. He sees a whole different outcome in his mind’s eye, though that might also be the itch’s bad influence.

They’ve locked themselves in some sort of battle of wills, waiting to see who makes the first move—who folds their cards and gives in. In that regard, Geralt rather feels like he has an unfair advantage, though he wields his yet-unnamed weapon like a blunt instrument, and with no direction. Really, his only plan is throwing himself at Emhyr hard enough that the man relents, all while leaving terrible, _questionable_ stains everywhere. It’s worked so far in his favor, so why not keep it up?

Wordlessly, Geralt breaches their distance again. His face now hovers a hand-width from Emhyr’s, and still Emhyr holds his gaze. 

If he were to sense even the smallest discomfort, he would stop. It’s just so overwhelmingly _not_ the case. Every sign is like a double negative. The threat of a glare hiding blown-wide pupils. He takes a breath and feels his own gut respond at how _strong_ Emhyr’s arousal smells.

Geralt prides himself in his intuition, and this—this is headed somewhere wild. He's fanning the flame a little too hard.

When it happens, he’s not sure who moves first. He blinks for a long second, and suddenly there’s a hand pinching the loose hair gathered over his nape, and teeth dragging against his throat. Something startlingly warm and wet follows the teeth’s path. He realizes that it's a tongue a half-second later. 

All thought runs to a halt as heat floods to the surface of that spot of skin.

Emhyr is—he’s _licking_ him. Blood is drying on the side of his face, sticking under his collar, and Emhyr is running his tongue right there, seemingly unperturbed by all the gore in his way.

“Oh,” Geralt breathes, stupefied. It’s not what he expected at all. 

Before he can say more, he’s pushed back against the desk by Emhyr rushing up from his seat. 

“Emhff,” he warbles, as the hand firmly grasping at his hair tugs his face down so that salt-copper lips can crash against his. “You— _m_ ffuck. ‘Mhyr.”

At his insistent tugging, Emhyr draws back and finally, he can breathe. He can _process_ what’s happening.

“Something the matter?” Emhyr says to him, like he’s not the one behaving out of touch.

“Just, gt—you,” is his eloquent response. “Shit, just give me a second.”

The hand on his hair tightens a fraction, but shortly relents. Emhyr gratefully grants him a minute’s respite, but only just.

“Are you done?” As the seconds passed, a hand had been slowly making its way down his front, only stopping to hook over his belt. He can feel the warmth of it through the layers of heavy clothing. It teases him without even moving.

He might be losing his mind.

“Alright.” Geralt swallows, reassessing the fervid look in Emhyr’s eyes. His compliance is all Emhyr waits for before diving forward again, but Geralt, illuminated by the bottomless _need_ revealed in that look, leans back quickly enough that Emhyr’s mouth doesn’t land where it wants to. “Uh-uh, not just yet.”

Emhyr doesn’t berate him for the withdrawal, but he doesn’t need to. Irritation shines through his unmoving stare clear as noon light.

“See,” the witcher starts, a wicked smile creeping up lips the more impatient Emhyr becomes with him. “If you’re just going to grope and take as you please, it’s only fair I get to do the same. Hmm?”

The hand at his belt loosens its dear grip, though not enough to fall away completely. It awards him the space he needs to run a fingertip, uninterrupted, up the middle seam of Emhyr’s trousers and right over the hard length struggling inside the fabric.

Emhyr doesn’t flinch at the touch—he barely even breathes. 

So he _does_ have self-control. 

Well, the witcher grins, then it’s time to test it.

With expert dexterity and the added benefit of tossing his thick, blood-heavy gloves off, he undoes the many buttons and chains of Emhyr’s attire. It still takes him time, and even then, he doesn’t bother to take off any more than the heavy coat that extends past Emhyr’s knees and the studded belt impeding his way from reaching more. The shirt beneath is opened, to expose unblemished skin. 

The imperial chain goes too, if only because it impedes his appreciative view.

Other than the twitch of a thumb, Emhyr doesn’t move. He lets the witcher run his hands up his backside to ruck the shirt up from its fixed state. The clothes earn a few bloody smears, but what’s a few in an evening barely started? 

And besides, Emhyr responds to it. He can smell it on him, how his scent pools and peaks the more he fondles him to indecency. The prominent tent under his hand is dotted with a damp summit. There’s something about how easily he waits against Geralt’s strokes, that tickles his thoughts to whimsy, imagining the impossible.

The words fly out of his mouth before he has time to reconsider.

“Kneel.” 

Emhyr’s eye, and only his eye, twitches. It’s a terrible test, seeing how far Emhyr will bend for a hungry desire yet unaddressed. Such an unpredictable thing to play with. One push too many and he might find himself tossed into the hall with his pants around his ankles. It wouldn’t matter if he came from Emhyr’s office, they would all think him the depraved witcher with no restraint, and their emperor the hapless victim. 

Emhyr kneels. 

Though it was supposed to work Emhyr up, Geralt is the one who is breathless, standing on legs that tremble by the slightest bit.

But now is not the time to be losing _his_ composure. Emhyr is looking at him as if in expectation, for once following _his_ direction. And he will not be disappointing either of them with hesitant steps, nor reluctant words. 

Again, Geralt runs a hand over his hair, so saturated with blood that it weighs the ends straight down. His other hand pries his trousers open, the buttons not so terribly sodden as to be troublesome.

“Good,” Geralt provides kindly to those serious, searching eyes. “That deserves a reward.”

He slides that wet hand over himself, twice from root to tip. It makes a frightening display when he’s done, cock at half mast and leaving dark red drops over the polished floor. 

He thinks he can smell Emhyr’s own cock grow wet. 

“You’re unbelievable,” he breathes, taken by the sight of Emhyr, the unyielding, unrelenting emperor of half the world, kneeling for _him._ Swiftly, so as to not make waste of the blood, he draws the man closer, but with his chin raised so he misses the arch of his cock entirely.

It nestles instead in the hollow of Emhyr’s wide, open chest, staining the spotless skin there red. 

Twin hands hug him by the meat of his thighs at his first thrust into the groove that runs between two blushing pecs. The gesture pulls them even closer, so that his legs press along Emhyr’s sides. 

Whether Emhyr did it for balance or for the closeness to his prize, it doesn’t matter, as Geralt takes his unsteady second to wind his cleaner hand under a dark mane of hair. His iron grip helps him to gain impetus. The oily blood, to slick the way.

Gods, he can feel Emhyr’s pulse thunder under his thumb. This is really doing something for him. They both look down at the easy slide of his cock, at the sticky strings of red that gather and drip down like an amateur artist’s brush, and it strikes him how little Emhyr cares of the blood’s origins. It ought to concern him—it ought to concern _Geralt._

The way his cock warms and glides, though, is just too good. He can feel the deep, faint rumble of a groan trapped in Emhyr’s chest, and he wants for it to escape. 

“This isn’t even human blood, you know,” Geralt offers casually over a particularly hard shove that brings his cock high enough to prod Emhyr’s throat. “You’re getting off on me being drenched in archgriffin guts. Did you know they’re poisonous? Not their blood, of course. I’m sure that wouldn’t stop you anyway, by how wound up you got after a taste.” 

He’s half expecting Emhyr to stop at his risky tease and glare him to an early grave, but the man is too busy looking at the dark red streaks against his chest to pay attention to him, or even allow Geralt a proper view. 

“I can’t believe I’m saying this but stop being so selfish and let me see what I’m doing.”

Emhyr finally stares up at that, pushing his arms together just so, that Geralt’s cock is trapped in a tight squeeze edging on painful. If only he wasn’t also _really_ into it.

“Or what, you’ll fuck me?”

His eyebrows fly up his scarred face. “Are you disguising what you actually want through a taunt? You want me to fuck you?”

“I am not going to ask.”

Geralt considers the hard words, begging no argument, against the contrary disposition of a wild pulse and near-imperceptible shortness of breath. 

He nods. “A different approach then.”

His free hand wraps under Emhyr’s armpit and pulls his entire weight to standing with little effort—and with just as much effort or less, Geralt pushes his pilfered emperor flat onto the desk.

A stack of papers topples to the floor and something like glass shatters. It’s not loud enough to cover Emhyr’s hiss.

The sound raises the hairs in the back of Geralt’s neck. That’s the most noise he’s made yet, and how it makes Geralt want to hear him actually let loose. 

The time will come. For now, he loosens the form-fitted pants from around Emhyr’s waist and tugs them down so they sit wrinkled at his thighs. 

The undergarments beneath are dark, glossy silk, probably spun from gold or something equally ridiculous. Geralt bets those undergarments cost more than all his witchering equipment together, and they’re absolutely ruined by his filthy fingers prodding the silhouette of a hard cock. 

He doesn’t bother with the silk, dragging it out of the way as well.

A myriad of thoughts barrel through his head at the sight of Emhyr's leaking cock. He could take it into his mouth, lavish it with attention until it bursts, and then lavish it some more. He could coat it with the oily, gross monster blood of Emhyr's apparent fascination and stroke him to completion. 

He could do so much to that reddened length, but what tempts him is something else altogether.

A curious hand takes initiative, slipping further away from the obvious target to the sensitive strip of skin hidden from his vision, and further down still.

The suggestive press of a dry finger actually startles Emhyr to near sitting.

“Relax. I’m not going to,” he promises, producing a proper vial of oil from his belt with a lopsided smile. “Not just yet.”

The skin is so hot there, so shy to his idle caress. Emhyr doesn’t tell him to stop. He huffs to himself, gold brown eyes an angry line, but he raises his bottom all the same to meet Geralt’s returning touch.

The trousers go completely, along with one tanned leather shoe so as to allow better reach for them both. He wouldn’t be able to kick his legs against Geralt’s back otherwise, and right now, with slow and diligent fingers pulling him apart, he makes liberal use of said legs, once nearly upending Geralt by the chin.

If this is any indication of how he usually takes for another, Geralt can’t imagine anyone tolerating it for more than a quick romp. But, then again, maybe it’s that he usually _doesn’t_ fall on the receiving end, and that tempers Geralt’s exasperation—smooths it down to the patience of a seasoned teacher dealing with a rowdy, knobby-legged pupil.

On the tentative push of a fourth finger, he hears a growled, _“Witcher,”_ and knows that’s the closest to begging Emhyr is capable of. 

“Alright,” he says with suppressed laughter, taking his fingers back with care, “You better not throw me off.”

Whatever Emhyr planned to retort with is swallowed by the sharp inhale he takes at Geralt pressing only slightly against his ass and still meeting resistance. There’s a reason he needed a thorough stretch. 

But Geralt is persistent, with due care. He pushes past the resisting muscle, all that he can fit until he’s snug against the back of Emhyr’s thighs.

At the first roll of his hips, something bursts in Emhyr’s gaze with animal ferocity. He claws at Geralt’s chest with every adjusting shove, ineffectively finding purchase as the blood turns his fingers slippery.

His nails scratch down Geralt’s arms and find purchase at the end of sodden sleeves. “Geralt,” he grates, hot breaths coming in short puffs.

Geralt grins down at him. It might be a monstrous look, with how his witcher’s eyes sharpen to thin black slivers, so focused on every minute twitch. But all Emhyr does is dig his heels into his back in urgent demand, unbothered—like with everything else—by his beastly expression. 

It’s strange, that he keeps expecting Emhyr to recoil away from him. That they would soon reach his limit, the end of what he’s willing to respond to. It never happens. Geralt rumbles something deep and throaty, like a predator in the underbrush, and Emhyr merely pins his bloody wrists harder, ordering without words that he hurry up and stop with his teasing.

He’s the true menace. Geralt is in awe of him. And also extremely, furiously, entertained by him.

“You want me,” the witcher pants, “to go faster? You’re taking, what I give you, your majesty.”

Emhyr holds his stare. One of his blood-slick hands slithers away and cups under Geralt’s balls. 

The prick tugs them, and _not_ in a pleasant way.

He stops, buried to the hilt, and holds Emhyr down by his face with one hand, pressing him hard onto the desk so he can’t reach so far down with his fingers anymore. 

That wakes something in them both, as he begins fucking mercilessly into him, and Emhyr, mad bastard that he is, starts to _really_ fight him. 

They thrash and grapple against each other, neither one making any move to part, just gain the upper hand. Emhyr does most of the thrashing, really. He drags harsh nails down his arms, struggling to put any weight that would budge the witcher and failing at every step. 

Then he jerks his head up to get his face out of the witcher’s grip and instead gets crude bloody fingers shoved into his mouth.

“Fuck, I—” Geralt means to stop and apologize for that. Didn’t mean to actually hurt him or, fuck, or choke him with monster blood on his tongue. 

But then he looks down and clamps his lips shut from saying a single word more. Of all things, Emhyr is _pushing up_ to them. His face is marred red with the saturated blood on Geralt’s hand. His eyes, peeking through the mess, are both a bright comet that glitters in the empty sky and the dark, bottomless pits of pupils blown glass-wide. 

Geralt can _feel_ his face burn under half his palm. More than that, he can feel him clench like a vice around him.

Wonders never cease to be.

“What is it,” Geralt gasps, his hips stuttering to a new start. “ _Ha_ what it is, exactly? The blood, or the wild barbaric hunter, taking what he wants? You like a little danger?”

Emhyr can’t talk with thick fingers stuffed past his lips, so he draws them out, so fast that pinked spit pops in the air. 

The growl that answers him spells more than _a little_ danger. It doesn’t help that Geralt’s been grinding against him nonstop, sheathed completely in his furnace hot body. 

“You wouldn’t hurt anyone unless they drew a blade on you first, witcher.”

“Yah. That’s true. Why—”

It’s right then, when Emhyr pulls a dagger on him, that he _actually_ pauses midthrust. 

The blade of the dagger is honed and sharpened to a deadly point, and not something to play with. Emhyr surely knows that. Geralt’s not sure where he pulled it from—if it was from the desk’s drawer, or from some discretely-sewn pocket on the inside of his disheveled clothes—but it’s poised at Geralt’s neck, the only part of him his armor really leaves exposed. One quick swipe with enough pressure could kill him. 

Geralt returns to fucking, at a slower, more considerate pace. 

He likes to think that he’s good at piecing things together, be it for a contract or figuring people out. People are tougher than beasts. There’s so much that could be running through their heads, whereas a beast usually just wants to eat and fuck and kill till something else kills it. 

Emhyr doesn’t do anything with reckless abandon. He’s calculating of every move, and nigh impossible to fluster, this thing unfolding between them being the closest exception Geralt has ever known. The dagger does not budge from its place under his jaw. It sits like a promise.

Geralt pushes against it.

Immediately the dagger retreats the same distance. It moves with him, always just hovering, like a threat unperformed. He raises his spit-coated hand and grips the blade’s handle, tight around Emhyr’s fingers. And drags it down until it’s against _Emhyr’s_ neck.

Unlike him, Emhyr pulls away from it, exposing more of himself to the cold metal. 

“Wouldn’t hurt anyone unless they drew a blade on me, hmm?” He murmurs into the skin of Emhyr’s shoulder. 

There is much that still confuses him, but this—the thrill of a fight that cannot be won—he understands. It’s not something he ever really feels the need to pretend at. Other people usually just ask for a harsh hand, and Geralt is very good at providing one for the occasion. 

But Emhyr, he sees a challenge and puts his entire will and being into it.

Geralt keeps the blade against ruddy skin, and at the foot that urges him to move, he carefully nicks a harmless strip of skin, a warning and a test wrapped in one. A thin line of red dips behind Emhyr’s ear, but no thicker than the trace of ink a pen makes.

It’s at the sight of real fresh blood that he blinks back into himself, realizing that he’s holding a blade to _the emperor’s throat._ If anyone were to walk in and see them—

Well, first he’d have to explain why he’s fucking the emperor, which would probably then be followed by the dagger in question. It would take forever to explain, and Emhyr would _not_ help. He’s certainly not being helpful _now._

A foot kicks at him to hurry again, and for that, he drags that ill-mannered ass over the edge just enough that when he thrusts it’s like Emhyr is falling on his cock, with Emhyr’s trembling thighs pinned on either side of his waist to keep from slipping. 

It’s a pleasant change of pace for him, and likewise a torturously better angle for Emhyr to start clawing him again. Emhyr’s cock slaps his own exposed stomach on every thrust. Even neglected, it drips persistently. He can’t be far off.

And he’s not alone. It’s been far too much, for too long, for Geralt to hold on any more. The friction had slowly escalated at first, quelled by timely interruptions, but now he can’t fight it down. It’s getting harder to keep a measured rhythm.

He concentrates on his grip, his body an extension of his stolen dagger. Nothing will ever go awry with his steady, easy handle of the blade. 

“Geralt,” his bloodied majesty rasps, his voice shot as if hoarse from shouting.

Geralt licks his own lips and catches the salt-copper taste of drying blood and sweat. Without a second thought, he spits it on the floor, not partial to the sharp taste.

He’s definitely doing a number on Emhyr because as his eyes narrow in displeasure, and Geralt pounds him ever faster, he doesn’t voice anything beyond a sharp groan. But then on a searching thrust, he straightens suddenly, legs pinning harder around Geralt’s waist. 

The witcher gives that angle good, steadfast attention, until Emhyr’s eyes widen and fail to focus on a point. 

Everything about him tenses like a thread about to snap. His hands, still scraping over every bit of Geralt they can find traction in. His shoulders, pressing back on the hardwood as if they could mold into them. His ass, a trap with ever tightening muscles that strain Geralt’s efforts to drive into him, but never successfully to a halt. 

“Tot-touch,” a stutter keeps Emhyr from finishing his demand—an honest _stutter_ that loops inside Geralt’s head like a sacred mantra. _He_ did that to him. He’s _doing_ that. 

Geralt obliges, oil-slick hand kneading his flushed, twitching cock. Just as well, a heartbeat passes before he seizes up and spills over scarred knuckles. It’s only when he’s sagging like boneless meat that Geralt takes the dagger from his scratched jugular and tosses it somewhere harmless.

Geralt follows him easily, through the last ounce of control he has, pulling away to rut against a chest-raised thigh and come, burying his face over the red mess drying over Emhyr’s chest.

The desk gives an ominous whine at his added weight, but it does not falter. It’s good craftsmanship. He might yet trust it as he takes a second—or minute—to breathe.

If only they’d done this on a bed. A couch, even. Emhyr himself melts against the desk uncaring, legs drooping down the edge after leaving a dozen heel-shaped bruises on Geralt’s back. By next morning, they will have faded, but in the moment, they ache a pleasant, hot thing. 

Once he can give a heavy sigh and not feel breathless, Geralt lifts up on elbows with a confident grin ready.

In the next instant, his grin falls to parted lips, his pulse beating unnaturally fast and hot once more. 

Emhyr looks like he went through a battlefield _and_ a brothel.

His dark hair drops over the hardwood, clumped in places with sweat and blood. His face is in a worse state, with a broad red smear that runs from his hairline down to his lower lip, the blurry shape of Geralt’s hand. The fine clothes still clinging to his frame are terribly wrinkled, marred with dark glossy fingerprints.

He wears the evidence of Geralt’s vulgarity with a satisfied flush. 

By his shut eyes, Geralt almost mistakes him to be asleep, but the clear rumble of Emhyr voice is far too awake for that to be even close to true. 

“You’re heavy.”

Geralt huffs, an easy retort in his head. He moves off to stand on his own two feet again anyway. It seems to him that, although his body protests the early push to action, Emhyr wishes to get up and clean himself, and he understands the desire. He winces in sympathy at the examining hand that knots in the sticky parts of Emhyr’s hair.

There’s a convenient little washbasin in the room, bedecked by a spout that permits fresh water to flow out of it. On the way to it, Emhyr fixes on his dark undergarments, buttons his shirt to the last stitch, and redresses in the ridiculously large coat that covers him down to his ankles. His trousers take him more time, but pulled up, they cling to his waist like second skin. It’s barely a problem under the coat.

With all of the evidence of their coupling hidden away, he’s nearly got Geralt convinced that he remains unaffected, after everything.

But at a tremble in his leg, Geralt forgoes his building disbelief and holds his arm out to help—even if Emhyr glares metaphorical daggers at him. 

He fixes Emhyr’s trousers for him with less finesse. His own fingers are horribly slippery after the oil, and now it smears the dark fabric of Emhyr’s attire alongside blood stains.

If Emhyr minds it, he doesn’t say anything to the case. 

“So, uh,” Geralt starts, a little at a loss with how to continue after everything he’s witnessed. “We gonna talk about what got you so worked up, so I can avoid doing it at your inconvenience?”

With his back turned to the witcher, Emhyr makes quick work of washing his hands first. The ends of his sleeves sport damning stains but by his dark choice of apparel and all the gold contrast to draw the eye more to his middle, it’s not immediately noticeable.

His face and the twin slivery cuts on his neck earn a splash next. Those will be harder to explain, should anyone notice.

On his next clean breath Emhyr offers a cursory, “Do you seek to avoid it, or present it at a moment of _your_ convenience?”

“Well.” Geralt hums. “Those don’t have to be mutually exclusive. Do you want me to guess? I’m a good guesser.”

Emhyr doesn’t face him as he slicks his dark hair back to its proper place. “Then I do not need to say it.”

“What, embarrassed of your predilection for blood and dangerous scenarios? Is it that I wouldn’t actually hurt you, even when you’re acting like a hellishly feral _brat?”_

“Predilections aside,” Emhyr starts, his voice a tad rougher, and still very much facing away, “You are in severe need for a wash. I will not have more of your presence until you don’t smell like a butcher’s house.”

Geralt blinks at him. “Are you serious?”

There, Emhyr gives his hair one last wet swipe. He turns with an apathetic expression in place. “Mererid should have a bath ready by now. I am sure he will be eager to get you to it.”

Refreshed, Emhyr almost looks the same as always, a hard mask of judgement worn easily over his face. If it weren’t for the blush covering him from his neck up to his ears.

Then he sits down and his whole face twitches, the fist that had raised minutely for his chin to rest on clapping down on the wood of the armrest.

Geralt sighs under his breath, as Emhyr creeps further down the chair to alleviate some weight off his backside—impressively discreetly, might he add—but as Geralt is the one who just fucked him, it’s rather redundant and unnecessary. 

Another one of those things he’ll have to figure out about Emhyr, when he’s _not_ covered in drying archgriffin blood.

For now, he simply shrugs. A bath is a bath. “Alright. You’ll have more of my _presence_ shortly.”

Once outside the forever-tarnished audience room, it takes less than a minute for Mererid to emerge out of the shadows like a ghost and forcibly guide Geralt to a private bathing room. It is far too extravagant to be a common area. Seeing as he’s frightened at least a dozen members of the nobility at the time of his arrival, the privacy is definitely more for everyone _else’s_ benefit than Geralt’s peaceful enjoyment.

“The gentleman may dump his rags in the basket, and please,” the chamberlain pauses to gesture vaguely, “Use the faucet to wash out the blood before sitting in the bath.”

“Hey, don’t be mad at me. It’s your imperial majesty who wanted to see me like this.”

Maybe more literally than the chamberlain realizes, but he’s not one to rat.

Mererid leaves before he can ask what the _‘faucet’_ is supposed to be. Does he mean the two oddly-decorative handles sticking out of the wall with a drain under them?

Well, if he’s wrong, the handle-thing still works amazingly to clean out a lot of the blood. The water coming out of it is steaming hot, even. 

Nilfgaardian ingenuity. He might be ruined from enjoying a simple town bath ever again. And the actual bath is even _hotter._ It stings _just_ to the point of being uncomfortable. 

Oh, his body sorely needed it. Every stiff muscle he’s ever known and felt melts under the blistering heat. 

It’s in the middle of soaping his hair—a lazy endeavor as he would rather bask in the water than move to accomplish any sort of cleaning—that Emhyr walks in.

And not from the bathroom door, but from a panel on the wall that opens with a silent click.

That’s _one_ secret passage the witcher won’t forget about.

Geralt rolls his head on the porcelain tub’s edge. “If you were hoping to catch me while I was still filthy—”

Emhyr stops him with a dismissive hand. “I assure you I have no idea what you are talking about.” 

“Mhm.” That again. One of these days, he’ll make Emhyr admit to what sways him. That day is just not today.

Whatever it is Emhyr wants, Geralt would rather finish bathing before it starts. Sex was fun and all, but he won’t stand another minute being suffused with the copper scent of old hunt’s blood under his nose. Emhyr can wait. 

And—besides that, how it happened that Emhyr is fixed up to look as immaculate and untouchable as ever is a mystery to him. Geralt swears he left first, and yet _somehow_ Emhyr is already wearing a clean set of clothes? He even hides the tiny cuts of the dagger well—is it magical glamor? Makeup?

That’s a question that will have to come _after_ he’s done with his wonderful bath. Nothing’s interrupting it, not even the emperor of the whole damn world seeking retribution for having ruined his ability to sit straight. 

Of course Geralt can’t have his wish. As he pours one last cup of warm water over his soapy head, Emhyr pulls up a stool behind him, the sole stool in the room reserved for the _‘faucet’._

He pulls Geralt’s head back by the forehead. “Hey—”

His complaint is unfortunately cut off by the wet brush that lathers his entire beard with a sweet-smelling cream. And then a razor quickly replaces the brush under his chin, which kills any sort of thought that could have been forming in his head. 

His throat clicks as he swallows. 

“Unless you want to get cut,” Emhyr warns, “Don’t move.” 

“Uh. Is this payback for holding a weapon to your neck? Even though you wanted me to?” 

“Nonsense.” 

Emhyr starts to shave him with what Geralt thinks are deliberately slow strokes. The only sounds in the room become the slight scraping of the blade against his rough skin and Emhyr’s relaxed breathing lightly tickling his forehead. A finger traces over his lip, up a spidery path that stops just under his scarred eye. It might be a dark vein. He’s still coming down from the potions.

It feels strangely, wholly, more intimate than being balls deep in Emhyr’s ass.

In all of Geralt’s life, he’s only ever let barbers shave his face. He rarely bothers to do it himself, so when it happens, it’s a time consuming process. Most of the time he just pays for a trim. The feeling of cold steel on his neck has never been any comfort or pleasure to him.

Emhyr pays meticulous attention to the dips and shadows of his jaw, and the short hairs that bristle near his ears. His gold brown eyes stay centered where the razor moves, his fingers wordlessly manipulating in which direction to tilt Geralt’s head. 

By the final swipe under his ear, Geralt is harder than he’s ever been in his life. 

Emhyr notices with an unimpressed high brow. 

“You, of all people, can’t judge me.” It could just be the hot water, but Geralt’s face is _burning._ Would be incredible if this is the time to discover he _is_ capable of blushing.

Emhyr hums, watching him like a hawk.

So, they’ve both discovered something about themselves today, and neither of them is going to admit it.

**Author's Note:**

> You can find me screaming [@seventfics](https://seventfics.tumblr.com) on tumblr and [@the_sevent](https://twitter.com/the_sevent) on twitter.


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